Psychotherapist's Journal | Thoughts and Tools to Inspire Wellness in Mind and Body by Karen Gorrin

Upcoming Tools for the Journey at Harmony Hill

Tools for the Journey is a one-day workshop offered at NO COST to people living with cancer and their caregivers. It is a full day of practical resources and strategies for how to live fully despite the challenges of cancer.

 One of my greatest gifts is the opportunity to serve on the faculty of Harmony Hill's cancer program. Harmony Hill is a beautiful place where magical "aha" moments and unexpected laughter happen all the time. It is  a place where all experiences are welcome, included time for uncertainty, sorrow, joy, and fear. There is time for walking the labyrinths, sitting in the gardens, reflection and journal writing, reading and deep conversation.

I'll be facilitating two Tools for the Journey dates this summer: June 28 and August 23. If you know someone living with cancer I hope you'll tell them about Harmony Hill. It's a very special place.

Tools for the journey includes simple movement, guided imagery, group support and lots of healing tools and resources. A delicious Harmony Hill lunch is also included! The majority of space in this program are reserved for people on the waiting list for the 3-day weekend cancer retreats. The other spaces are open to any individual with a cancer diagnosis and their loved ones.

For more information or to register please visit the Harmony Hill website.

Warmly,
Karen

Lifespan Integration Therapy Heals Deeply and Completely without Re-Traumatizing

About three years ago I began to incorporate a new method of therapy into my practice called Lifespan Integration. Lifespan Integration, or "LI" has proven to be a very valuable tool in helping my clients heal trauma and childhood neglect without the need to directly talk about past events and -- it really works!

I have found Lifespan Integration to be a gentle yet profound therapeutic modality. I'm deeply grateful for the rapid healing Lifespan Integration has helped me facilitate in the lives of my clients.

The brilliance of Lifespan Integration is that it works by relying on the innate ability of the body-mind to heal itself. From the client's perspective, Lifespan Integration feels like a guided imagery/visualization or hypnotherapy session, although what's actually happening is a targeted neural integration process that convinces the body-mind system that time has passed and the triggering event or circumstances are over. Lifespan Integration uses a timeline of memories to help the client heal events from the past and then bring their full healthy selves forward in time to the present. Lifespan Integration also works with clients who have difficulty remembering their past. People with memory gaps are eventually able to connect the pieces of their lives together into a coherent whole. It's a beautiful thing!

Typically, Lifespan Integration works faster and more completely than "talk therapy" methods alone. I have witnessed Lifespan Integration effectively treat anxiety and post traumatic distress disorder, attachment disorders, eating disorders, somatic disorders, and dissociative disorders. These are BIG words that all refer to a range of labels given to the distress people may have in response to traumatic life experiences or/and childhood neglect. 

Because of my focus in mind-body medicine, many of my clients seek support with anxiety or somatic complaints (when our emotions are expressed in our bodies) or when an unexpected life-changing event or health diagnosis has caused them significant emotional, mental, physical, and spiritual distress. Lifespan Integration Therapy together with relaxation training modalities like meditation or/and biofeedback physiotherapy have worked great. I have successfully used Lifespan Integration Therapy with clients moving through loss and grief, living with a cancer diagnosis, with fibromyalgia and other autoimmune disease, digestive and irritable bowel complaints, and others seeking to better manage work/life demands and increase fulfillment in intimate relationships.

To learn more about Lifespan Integration Therapy I encourage you to visit the Lifespan Integration website or contact me for a free telephone introduction. Lifespan Integration was created by psychotherapist Peggy Pace.

Power of Ritual at the American Cancer Society

Yesterday I had the great privilege of leading a training for the Quality of Life team at the American Cancer Society Seattle office. I had been invited to speak about greif and loss, and to design a ritual to support the patient navigaotrs in their work with patients.

Ritual is a tool that encourages us to express ourselves though story, symbol, and action. The power of ritual, no matter how simple, is not to be underestimated. Have you ever noticed that ritual can last a moment - as in lighting a candle, or it can last for hours - with song, dance, drumming, and costumes? Ritual may be used to request a healing, honor a transformation, or communicate with the divine.

For some people, ritual is experienced as a form of prayer - a conversation with God, or higher spiritual power. Anthropologists tell us we are experiencing a revival of ritual, possibly because ritual offers an experience that can be "spiritual but not religious."

For yesterday's ritual, I carefully selected a piece of music that had recently been introduced to me by my colleagues at Mind/Body Associates International. The song, Devi Prayer, comes from the album, 108 Sacred Chants of Mother Divine by Craig Pruess & Ananda. It is a beautiful, meditative chant that I find evokes calm and serenity.

We began yesterday's ritual with a guided meditation, designed to create stillness in mind and body. Then, each participant was invited to select a river rock from a large bowl. The rock was to symbolize people the patient navigator had supported but are no longer working with, either because of recovery or death.

All About Not Knowing

“… Not knowing – the answer, the goal, or even the next step – is generally associated with deficit or failure in our culture. How then, do artists, writers, and other creative people cope with such indeterminacy, learning to live with the anxiety it produces and even coming to understand it as part of the creative process? …”

These were the opening words I shared at the Thriving Beyond Cancer: Thriving in Uncertainty workshop I facilitated last year at Harmony Hill Retreat Center. The insightful author of those words was the UCLA Fowler Museum staff from long-ago exhibit materials.

How relevant to the artist, this idea of not-knowing. How relevent to us all, as we create our lives one day at a time. One moment at a time. The perpetual blank page. The on-going creative process.

Have you ever noticed the tendency to avoid "not knowing" by placing something ontop, as a way to try and make not-knowing into the known? How does that work for you? I welcome your thoughts.

I will be offering this program again soon ... Monday, April 28. You are welcomed to attend this program at no-cost if you are a cancer survivor or a cancer caregiver; and you are physically able to move between buildings and short distances. For more information or to register, click here. Hope to see you there.

How to Lead Your Life

"If you lead your life the right way, the karma will take care of itself. The dreams will come to you." says Carnegie-Mellon professor Randy Pausch in his inspiring lecture and new book, The Last Lecture. See excepts from the lecture and Pausch's interview with Diane Sawyer below, or watch the full hour lecture as I did, by clicking here.

Upcoming Cancer Programs at Harmony Hill

It is my great pleasure to serve on the faculty at Harmony Hill Retreat Center. My experiences working with people living with cancer are consistently heart-warming. I always walk away from my time on the hill having received at least as much as I have given. What is more, the staff and volunteers of Harmony Hill are truly the kind of individuals one calls friends. Please share this information with the people you know who are living with cancer.

In case you don't know, Harmony Hill offers Cancer Retreats at no charge. You can read all about the program, philosophy, and their inspirational founder Gretchen Schodde on the Harmony Hill website.

Here are some of the upcoming workshops and cancer retreats I'll be facilitating at Harmony Hill. For their complete this of cancer programs, please visit the Calendar.

3-Day Cancer Retreat
Friday - Sunday, March 16-18, 2007
Facilitated by Karen Gorrin, Margo Walsh, and Karen Kirsch

Harmony Hill’s cancer retreats are weekend residential programs that help those facing cancer, and their loved ones, cope with the physical, emotional, and spiritual challenges of cancer. Through stress reduction skills, guided imagery, daily support groups for learning and sharing, yoga, and massage, participants facilitate their own healing and restore quality of life.
Learn More >>

Thriving in Uncertainty
Monday, March 26, 2007
Facilitated by Karen Gorrin

Life after a cancer diagnosis is graduate training in living in Mystery! Nowhere has it been proven, though, that a rich life cannot exist in the presence of deep uncertainty. Learn how befriending the unknown can be the entryway into living a full, wise, and passionate life. Receive tools for turning uncertainty into possibility and adventure.
Learn More >>

Tools for the Journey
Monday, April 23, 2007
Monday, May 14, 2007
Monday June 25, 2007
Facilitated by Karen Gorrin and Melode Brewer

This one-day mini-retreat is a full day of practical resources and strategies for how to live fully despite the challenges of cancer, and includes simple movement, guided imagery, and information about healing tools and resources. A delicious Harmony Hill lunch is also included! Learn More >>